At the end of last month, it was announced that emcee Minomonta is leaving NTV's "Omoikkiri Ii! TV" at the end of March. The network has now revealed that it is expanding the show by an extra 90 minutes, and that talento Hideyuki Nakayama will be Minomonta's successor.

The new format is tentatively titled "Omoikkiri DON!" It is scheduled to start at 10:25am each weekday instead of its current 11:55am start, but it will still run until 1:55pm for a total of three and a half hours. As a result, it will take over some of the duties of the earlier morning show "Rajikaru," which Nakayama currently hosts.

Minomonta and "Omoikkiri Ii! TV" will end their run on March 27. The new show begins on March 30.

Maki Goto is officially resuming her music career with a dance tune titled "Fly Away." This is her first new material since nearly a year and a half ago, when she voluntarily suspended herself after her brother Yuki was arrested for theft.

"Fly Away" is a collaboration with young author Hitomi Kanehara, who won the Akutagawa Prize for her 2003 novel "Hebi ni Piasu" ("Snakes and Earrings"). Both are participating in a Mixi-sponsored cross-media project called "SWEET BLACK." For her part in the project, Kanehara has written a short story titled "Mambo," which Goto used as the basis for the lyrics of "Fly Away."

The song, which is being released under the name SWEET BLACK feat. Maki Goto, goes on sale digitally through Recochoku starting on the 21st. Although there are currently no plans for a CD release, it is not out of the question. Goto may also collaborate with other authors in the future.

A preview video for "Fly Away" is now available on Avex's YouTube channel and on her newly updated website.

This past week, the "Hana Yori Dango Final" DVD sold 13,000 copies, making this its fourth consecutive week as the #1 Japanese live-action film. Its total sales are now at 308,000, which puts it past "Ima, Ai ni Yukimasu" as the 3rd best selling Japanese live-action movie DVD of all time. It currently still ranks behind "Odoru Daisousasen 2" and "Sekai no Chuushin de, Ai wo Sakebu."

"Hana Yori Dango Final" is also now the top selling Japanese DVD of 2008, surpassing the 298,000 copies sold by "Evangelion: 1.0 You Are (Not) Alone."

Hideaki Takizawa, also known as Tackey of Tackey & Tsubasa, released his first solo single last week, titled "Ai Kakumei." The song led the charts at 57,000 copies, making him the first member of a group to reach #1 with a debut solo single since Koichi Domoto did it in 2006.

At #2 was Junko Akimoto, still riding a wave of renewed interest after Kohaku Uta Gassen. Her "Ai no Mama de," originally released last January, continued its ascent for the second week in a row. Mihara also saw her album "Second Story" jump from #54 to #23 this past week. Released in August, it debuted at #90 and quickly fell off the charts, but it resurfaced at #67 about a month ago.

New singles from Remioromen, The Possible, and Base Ball Bear entered the rankings at #3 to #5.

On the album charts, EXILE and Mr.Children regained their top spots, taking #1 and #2 to bump Ikimono Gakari down to #3. In terms of new releases, indie band SOUTAISEIRIRON made #7 with their first full album, while Base Ball Bear picked up #10.

On Saturday, Fuji TV aired a special episode for its "Code Blue" drama series, which was broadcast last year. The episode achieved ratings of 23.1%, surpassing the ratings of the original series.

Last summer, "Code Blue" reached its peak at 21.2% with the opening episode. Over the whole season, it averaged 15.9%, which was the highest out of all the summer dramas.

It was recently reported that talento Misako Yasuda (26) and actor Yu Shirota (23) are in a romantic relationship. However, both of their agencies denied the rumor on Tuesday, saying that they have only heard that the two are friends.

In 2007, Shirota starred in the manga-to-film adaptation "Arakure Knight," and Yasuda played the part of his girlfriend.

Yasuda was previously linked to actor Shuji Kashiwabara, but they broke up shortly after the release of "Arakure Knight."